Harder than I thought!

Days since I posted, and yet today was actually the first day this month when I haven't spent anything at all - most of the other days it's been things from the internet that I'd been planning on for ages, or groceries, so at least no reckless personal extravagance, but still... Roast chicken yesterday, chicken with bubble and squeak today; treat meal for J and me the night before (scallops with bacon, chocolate souffle) as we were alone in the house for once; tuna pasta bake the night before that and left over beef in other forms most days between then and when I last posted; grocery spending definitely coming down, which is just as well as still severely cash poor at the moment.
Only one more week to half term. Got quite a lot done today; have now finished cutting the nasty scallops off the bottoms of all the blinds in our bedroom, and replacing them with nice grey satin ribbon from Ebay - effectively a new set of blinds for £8 - not bad! J wants me to paint our bathroom next, so not quite onto the hall and landing just yet, but won't be too long, I hope. Well worth the discipline of keeping up with this blog, if I can be bothered.

Beginning with a whimper, not a bang...

Today, I was sure, would be my first no-spend day of the new regime; except it wasn't, because I bought some dog tags on Etsy. They cost less than £6, and I'd been planning to get them for months, so it was neither wildly extravagant nor an ill-controlled impulse, but still, it's a shame that I didn't even realise what I was doing till some hours later. I can see this is going to be harder than I thought. I have a horrible mouth ulcer on the underside of my tongue, yet am strangely reluctant to go and buy any Bonjela to ease the pain - bizarre.
Still: not a bad day otherwise, though home usefulness curtailed by having to collect both girls from school on slightly spurious medical grounds. Painted the first coat on the last wall of our bedroom, so the end of another room is in sight: the house has about 16 rooms, depending how you count halls and lobbies and so forth, and I have painted 3 mostly rather small ones so far, so I am not without future toil here, but still encouraging. Definitely doing better with food: cold beef and piped potato and chickpea oven cakes (invented but good) tonight, and we finished the last Christmas mince pies, finally! And we received new food recycling bins from the council today; how sad that I found this quite exciting ; /

New beginnings

Right: new week and month, missed the new year. Will use this blog to keep track of household economy for a bit. Today: beef pot roast with mash and carrots, left over chocolate trifle. Was meant to be a no spend day, but had to buy milk - c. £1.56. Reasonably good (but not perfect!) about computer time.

Look what we did!

Japan in London

Today I did a civilised thing: I went up to London to go Christmas shopping, and met John for lunch. I ought to have gone last week, but couldn't because of a burglar alarm incident, but as he couldn't have met me if I had gone then, it worked out for the best. We had sashimi and tempura at the Japan centre, which was just lovely. As we paid, I noticed a young Japanese couple at the table next to the till, who seemed to be students over here to learn English, perhaps, as she had a notebook beside her full of notes in Japanese, but with four English words - and presumably their Japanese translations - at the top of the page.

The words were

swine flu
Olympics
banks
McDonalds

Excellent basis for someone visiting London, surely?!

Afternoon theatre

Setting: afternoon cup of tea, Dad's care home.

Old lady, with jet black hair and a piercing gaze, from seat by the wall, to old man nearby: "It's that woman, you know." (Points at empty space in front of her.) "She's the problem. I know some men here who could get rid of her. That's what she needs, getting rid of."

Old man, looking confused: "Really?"

Old lady. "Yes. That's what they should do, get rid of her. She's an interloper. She should go."

Old man, looking worried: "I think I'll go back to my room now."

Old lady, with more piercing stare, leaning forwards: "I wouldn't do that if I were you. That's not a good idea at all. You might get killed. I should stay down here if I was you. Stay down here and just walk around a bit. That's best."

Old man, getting up as rapidly as possible: "Good idea. I'll do that."

Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, my father has corrected me on the pronounciation of the old fashioned pharmaceutical unit "drachms" (pronounced drams), had an entirely lucid conversation about the girls, his supper, etc, and then told me a completely invented story about how he was suddenly stricken ill and required to use a zimmer frame, admitted to hospital, etc, on his way back from a trip to Guildford Cathedral, where he hasn't been for about 40 years, as far as I know.

It's so bizarre: someone can use the word "interloper" correctly in the midst of quite severe dementia, and Dad drops random moments of fantasy into our painful, laboured conversations. And the world is full of hidden scenes just like this, every day, from the wreckage of so many once full lives: and none of us knows whether this is the future waiting for us or not. Just as well, perhaps.

Interval

Right, this blog is officially on hiatus while we move, because I have enough distractions already. Back sometime, I hope.